Who Cares?
by Lavande
Summary: DBZ-Ficlet: Bulma thinks she's all alone, but is she? PG-13 for mild cursing.


Who cares…

Who cares…?

Bulma looked around the empty room. Her friends had left, after she had finally convinced them she was doing fine. ChiChi had given her a look as though she didn't quite believe that, but Goku had urged her to leave along with the others. "Maybe she has to be alone now," he had whispered in his usual loud voice. It had caused Bulma to smile, if ever so briefly. _Perhaps he is right. Perhaps I'm better off alone for a while. Sorting things out…_

And alone she was, with Vegeta off to train somewhere, taking nearly the whole kitchen with him, and her parents… She suppressed the thought and started to wander around, without having a real destination. _I never noticed how quiet this house could be,_ she thought. _Now that there's noone around but me… everything has… stopped._ She listened carefully, but there was no sound but the faint humming of some radiator. No Vegeta blowing the gravity room to bits, or at least yelling for his food. ~_Woman, I'm HUNGRY!_~ Bulma suddenly felt very lonely. No Dad working on some advanced capsule technology or playing with his kitty. ~_Could you hand me that 9er spanner, dear?_~ Somehow, breathing seemed to get harder and harder. No Mom spending her time in the kitchen or running around with her compulsory tray. ~_Just sit down, dear, I'll have us a nice little breakfast._~ Tears started running down her cheek. Never before had she felt that tired.

_I better go and have some sleep. What else is there to do?_ With that thought, she headed upstairs for her room.

_"Watch out!!" Brakes screeched as Dr. Briefs desperately tried to avoid the truck which had suddenly swung over to their side of the road. The last thing Bulma remembered, before a violent impact had wiped out her world, was the horrified face of her mother._

"Daddyyyyy!!!"

Bulma awoke with her own screaming. Tears streamed down her face, her body was shaking. "Daddy…" she whispered, her throat still sore from her cry. "Mommy…" The shaking grew more intense, as she remembered her awakening in the hospital.

~_You had a very heavy accident, Miss Briefs. It's a wonder you're only slightly hurt._~ She closed her eyes, but the pictures just wouldn't go away. ~_Your parents… I'm afraid that we couldn't help them. They died immediately._~ That had been the first time she had ever felt that loneliness. A black hole that was devouring her, letting her fall and fall and fall…

The next morning found her sitting in the kitchen, trying to eat some breakfast. Somehow it all didn't seem that hard in the light of day. _I just have to wait… only half a year, and we can use the Dragonballs to wish them back. Goku promised he'd help me… and Krillin, too… _They had all been there at the hospital, waiting for her to wake up. Goku, and ChiChi, and Krillin, and Yamcha, and Puar, and even Vegeta, sitting in a corner of the room as if he didn't belong to the others. Vegeta… _If only you would be here. Then it wouldn't be so terribly quiet… so quiet…_

She felt tears starting to build up again. _No… no need to cry… I just have to wait…_

After a few days Bulma knew she wasn't going to make it. She had never been all alone before in her life, and she didn't know how to cope with that feeling of solitude. It began playing tricks on her, letting her hear voices in the hum of the radiator. But there never was anything… just silence… that silence…

It drove her mad, she could feel it. She reached for the telephone, dialing ChiChi's number. Goku's cheery voice was greeting her.

"Hello! Sorry for not being at home, but you can…"

Bulma hung up the phone, her hand trembling slightly. She knew Yamcha was off training, so it was no use trying to call him. _Damn his training! Why does he have to train now?! Doesn't he know that I need him? _She sighed. It wasn't Yamcha she was thinking about, was it? No, it certainly was another pair of dark eyes that came into her mind. It was almost funny how she missed him. The yelling, the fighting, even her needing to fix his gravity room every three days. _You never know what you have… Vegeta, why did you leave just now? An unexpected hint of consideration?I need you… I can't stand to be alone!_

She listened. _Silence…everything's silent…_ Bulma started to giggle quietly, not even noticing the tears that had started to fall. _If only I hadn't said I was alright… If only Vegeta was here… If only… If only…_

"If only I had died, too! I wish I had! Who would have cared?" she started sobbing as the loneliness finally took over. "Who cares about me anyway?" she cried, clutching herself as the pain started to ring through every corner of her being. "Who cares…?"

_Your friends care_, said a voice inside her head. "Yeah?! Then why did they leave me… why did they leave me all alone?!" she screamed, her body shaking violently with her crying. 

"You _are_ _not_ alone, stupid." This time the voice came from behind her. She spun around, only to look into a too familiar scowling face.

"Ve… Vegeta…?" she asked hesitantly, not daring to trust her eyes. _He would never come… he would never know I need him…_

"You are a fool, woman" he said softly.

Something inside her broke. She flung herself into his welcoming arms, letting out all her grief with heartbreaking sobs. He held her body as tight as he could without hurting her, trying to comfort her as much as possible. He gently stroke her trembling back, while she slowly calmed down.

Vegeta caught the woman as she suddenly collapsed, exhausted from her crying and the emotional turmoil she had been through with the loss of her parents. Bulma cuddled into his warm embrace, barely conscious, a light smile playing around her lips.

"Vegeta…" she whispered, drifting off to sleep, but no longer afraid of nightmares. She knew that they wouldn't come again.

"What?" he asked, picking her up as if she weighed nothing.

"You _do_ care, don't you?" she murmured, her eyes almost closed. Yet she could see his brief smile, lightening up his dark features with an unusual warm glow, as he carried her upstairs to her room.

"Woman, just shut up."

This took me an hour, so please don't scream at me. I _am_ a slow writer. :) And I don't own DBZ *sniff*… or at least Vegeta… *starts to sob*


End file.
